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Date of Award

Spring 2025

Document Type

Masters Thesis (Campus-Only Access)

Department or Program Affiliation

English Department

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

English

First Advisor

Trueblood, Kathryn R., 1960-

Second Advisor

Guess, Carol, 1968-

Third Advisor

Forsythe, Jenny

Abstract

Presented here are the first two parts of seven of The Girl in the Mirror, a fictional story concerning a severely mentally ill and psychotic girl named Lupe, who relates the story in first person from a trapped mental space referred to as “The Dollhouse.” The story seeks to be an honest expression— emotionally rather than medically— of what it is like to have a severe mental illness. As such, the work features surrealist tendencies, non-chronological sequencing of events, and frank discussion of uncomfortable topics such as self-harm and sexual assault. In addition to mental illness, the story explores themes such as identity, religion, generational trauma, and suffering. Although classified as a horror story intended to evoke the grotesque, the story is written with attention and care to poetics so that the beautiful and repulsive may mingle together on the page and in the reader’s mind.

Type

Text

Keywords

horror, mental illness, psychosis

Publisher

Western Washington University

OCLC Number

1522948892

Subject – LCSH

Mentally ill women--Fiction; Mental illness--Fiction; Psychoses--Fiction; Sexual assault--Fiction; Parasuicide--Fiction; Identity (Philosophical concept)--Fiction; Religion--Fiction; Generational trauma--Fiction; Suffering--Fiction

Format

application/pdf

Genre/Form

masters theses

Language

English

Rights

Copying of this document in whole or in part is allowable only for scholarly purposes. It is understood, however, that any copying or publication of this document for commercial purposes, or for financial gain, shall not be allowed without the author’s written permission.

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